Basically from 1900 to 1930 the population grew from 87,565 to 168,592. Then from 1930 to 1940 the city drop down to 164,292. But then it shot back up to 176,515 by 1950 and kept growing until it reach 197,649 by 1970. But then the flight to suberbia caused the city to nose dive a low in 1980 of 189,126. But begining in 1990 the city rebounded to the year 2000's population of 197,800 people. Unless the city has experienced a massive nose drive between 2000 and now it seems the city has the highest population in its history.

Any thoughts?

Also while we are at it, lets have some fun by predicting what GR's population will be in 2010 and in 2020. I'm predicting 210,000 (city) 1.4 million (MSA) and 250,000 (city) 1.65 million (MSA) respectively.

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You won't be seeing GR's Immediate population boom anytime soon. That's not to say it'll decline. But GR covers a very small land area for a city of it's size, realistically it's much denser than it's counterparts of like size. Given the fact that the city is walled in on all sides by incorporated land, it can't expand in size. Additionally suburban residents in the area tend to be particularly rigid when it comes to the core city, and would never consent to any kind of annexation. The only way the city can make more than small gains in population is for downtown to start sprouting up high density housing in numbers far greater than are happening now. The city is essentially built out , but certainly not up.

Although it is a Texas Real Estate site, it does look like someone has been doing the painstaking process of gathering all the relevant census data and charting it.

GR/Wyoming MSA is growing, but in the past three years it's mainly due to births outnumbering deaths 2 to 1. Net domestic migration for the metro has not been good, my guess is mainly due to the recession and manufacturing job losses we had in 2002 - 2005. Out migration looks to have peeked in 2004 at -4036. That probably explains the housing market funk. But 2005 was better than 2004.

Before you get too disheartened, take a look at other metro areas and you'll see some striking numbers. Chicago metro had a net population gain of about 41,000 last year, but their net domestic migration was -74,712 (that many more people moved out of Chicago metro area (suburbs included) than moved in).

It's very eye-opening when you see population growth numbers with the births/deaths separated out. LA has been losing people by the 100s of thousands, yet they're birth rate is unbelievably high (196,000 births to 78,000 deaths), which when combined with international immigration, has resulted in a small positive population gain in 2005 of .2%.

The only cities that consistently had high net domestic migration numbers are all Southern cities (to no surprise).

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It will be interesting to see the 2010 numbers when they come out. The official census is always much different then these "mid term" number counts. Prior to the 2000 census, they estimated GR was loosing population.

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Oh, just so people know, the new American Community Survey is a HORRIBLE measure of actual population. It's meant more to show general demographic changes. In fact, as bad as the Census Estimates are they are still better than the ACS (American City Survey). The ACS even knows that its focus is not to measure population as it shows you +/- thousands of residents, so pay little attention to the actual number.

BTW, the historical population chart on Wikipedia is from the United States Census over the decades. I know, because I added them (tediously) to most Michigan major city pages on the site.

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Wow! That is an unerving answer. For measuring statistics this may have been a good idea. But the unerving part of it is this question. Politically and Economically, is the change hurting GR since the revisions to our MSA droped our Metro's population from 1.2 million down to roughly 750,000? That's 450,000 people abruptly disapearing from the Metro Area all at once. From what I understand, funding of cities for things like schools, roads, infrastructure, etc, come from both state and federal governments whom determines how much funding a city gets based on population among other things. The change must have effects on GR's share of the pie.

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Wow! That is an unerving answer. For measuring statistics this may have been a good idea. But the unerving part of it is this question. Politically and Economically, is the change hurting GR since the revisions to our MSA droped our Metro's population from 1.2 million down to roughly 750,000? That's 450,000 people abruptly disapearing from the Metro Area all at once. From what I understand, funding of cities for things like schools, roads, infrastructure, etc, come from both state and federal governments whom determines how much funding a city gets based on population among other things. The change must have effects on GR's share of the pie.

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Yes, but that is only true of cities not replacing those with inward migration. But, out of curiosity, didn't the census predict over the 1990's, that Grand Rapids was losing population, and it turned out that it was quite the opposite? I always say to take these things with a grain of salt, though, it is definitely more likely, now, that the numbers are closer to reality especially with the downsizing, restructuring economy.

Lastly, just so everyone knows, the Census estimate formula counts automatically handicap older established cities as they calculate city estimates only by its number of housing units, as opposed to how they calculate estimates for counties using birth, death and migration records. As we all know, many older established cities are getting rid of a lot of empty housing, and that automatically lowers any population estimate for that city. An example is Detroit, which is finally going to challenge the census numbers, it said today, trying to get back 7% of its count. And in a city which is demolishing so much empty housing, the estimates really almost inaccurate enough to be worthless.

So, take these things with a grain of salt and realize how even cities like Grand Rapids, Lansing, Kalamazoo, Ann Arbor, ect.... are instantly under-counted.

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I'd take those estimates with a grain of salt. The following is the actual census from 1990 and the census estimates from 1990 through 1999. It shows a peak of 190,418 on July 1, 1990 and a low of 185,009 on July 1, 1999, just nine months before the April 1, 2000 census. This showed a drop of 4,664 from April 1, 1990 through July 1, 1999.

April 1, 1990 Census: 189,673

July 1, 1990 Estimate: 190,418

July 1, 1991 Estimate: 189,681

July 1, 1992 Estimate: 189,619

July 1, 1993 Estimate: 189,226

July 1, 1994 Estimate: 189,052

July 1, 1995 Estimate: 188,937

July 1, 1996 Estimate: 188,579

July 1, 1997 Estimate: 187,656

July 1, 1998 Estimate: 186,219

July 1, 1999 Estimate: 185,009

When the 2000 census figures were released, it showed the following.

April 1, 2000 Census: 197,800

With the way the census estimates were trending, you would have guess that the April 1, 2000 census would be around 184,600. That is a huge difference from 197,800.